Monday, September 19, 2005

When Stanton pitched the ball, and Teague scampered into the end zone in overtime, and the State bench erupted in a spasm of glee, and our guys wandered off the field, stunned, and their guys did this, and we lost the game, even after a twenty-one-point comeback...well, it felt like a slap in the face.

And like a slap in the face, it stung for a little while. But by the time I made it back to the tailgate, the sting was already subsiding, the redness was going down, and I was thinking about silver linings and positive signs and taking solace in the fact that we'd fought really, really hard to send that game into overtime. As my friend Leo said, we've all felt a lot worse walking out of that stadium before.

And just when I rationalized it to the point where I'm sort of feeling okay with losing this one, Charlie has the temerity to slap me again.

I told [the team] that they don't give out medals for trying, that they shouldn't feel good about themselves for coming back. You know how you have team wins? Well this was a team loss. Give Michigan State their credit. They made more plays than we did. We just made too many mistakes. On offense, on defense, on special teams. All across the board...

People are down, but I just want them to know that it's not okay to lose. You can't feel good about coming back.